With violent crime growing every year and society becoming ever more aggressive it is increasingly common for people to feel physically threatened on a regular basis. Violent crime wrecks lives, but more commonly it is the fear of violence that reduces our quality of life. In response, the WT system has adapted classical wisdom about combat to the modern setting.

Adapting the Classical Art to Modern Situations

In modern society, the nature of the threat has changed. Classical Wing Tsun assumes you will face an opponent in a duel-type situation - your attacker's intentions are clear, and it is a fight to the death. In contrast, an attacker in the modern environment seldom reveals the intention to attack until the attack has commenced. A modern self-defence program must deal with an attacker who may use any means of deception to approach and breach your range.

Psychology of Attack

The primary objective of effective self-defence strategies must be to force your attacker to reveal his/her intentions. This becomes more important than the application of any physical techniques. 

In order to do this effectively, several skills are required. Firstly, total awareness must be raised in all situations. On top of this awareness can be built an understanding of the psychology of the most common types of attacker. The modern program teaches people how to stay in control and manage threatening situations. This gives you the best possible chance of escape or evasion, or of applying physical techniques at the right moment, should you be forced to do so.

Pre-emptive Response

Once it is clear that an attack is intended, and escape is impossible, the best solution is to be pre-emptive. The first half of the modern student program revolves around teaching extremely effective physical attacks to use in street-type situations. The second half teaches more advanced skills that can be used in response to much less predictable patterns of attack. At all stages the concept of precluding the possibility of attack is foremost.

A good reason to learn self-defence

A good knowledge of self-defence not only protects you, but gives you the confidence to enjoy yourself. You may only be attacked once in your life, and self defence will give you every chance of avoiding or dealing with this horrible event. More importantly, self-defence protects you from the 10,000 times you feel threatened.

Effective

The WT system at its root is a scientific form of self-defence. It educates its practitioners in all stages of attack from the psychological build up to the physical defence. Used by elite police units all over the world including the FBI, SEK, RAID and NOKS, in addition to being the foremost school in civilian self defence, WT is considered the ultimate stage in the evolution in self-defence.

Grand Master Kernspecht teaching the FBI Hostage Rescue Team

Safe and Enjoyable!

The most important aspect of any system of self-defence even before its effectiveness is that when it is being learned it is both safe for the practitioners and enjoyable. Since being attacked is usually a once in a lifetime experience, there seems little point in practicing a system which over a lifetime of practice will have exposed you to more danger and unpleasantness than the original threat.

Cooperation is Effective

WT is enjoyable and safe because at its heart is a cooperative strategy, never matching strength with strength or aggression with aggression. WT's cooperative nature is vital for any self defence system since an attacker is likely to be both physically stronger and more aggressive. The mental and physical fluidity of the WT practitioner allows them to consistently avoid attack.

Practical and Ethical

WT uses a system of psychological interaction which can be fitted into everyday life, allowing a practitioner to be friendly and confident but also being able to respond evasively to aggression. It avoids violence as much as possible without compromising the practitioners safety.

Imperceptible

The WT strategy forms a series of seamless stages from detection and evasion of low levels of aggression up to the response to physical attack. Informing of the dangers and the tools to deal with them, every student can tailor their response to their own personality and morality so that they can use the training instinctively.